OCEAN SHORES  The newborn found abandoned Friday night in an Ocean Shores vacant lot died as a result of a homicide, the Grays Harbor County Coroners Office ruled Sunday.

An autopsy was conducted on the newborn girl Sunday morning, Deputy Coroner Lane Youmans said in a statement: The Pathologist concluded that the baby died as a result of skull fractures and brain injuries due to blunt-force injury of the head. The manner of death is homicide............

A 21-year-old Grays Harbor woman was identified Saturday afternoon as the mother of the newborn baby, whose body was found Friday night discarded in bushes on the wooded lot about a half mile south of the Ocean Shores Airport........

Because of media coverage, there were some people who were familiar with her and some of the comments she made, so that led investigators to her, said Hoquiam Police Chief Jeff Myers, acting as the public information officer at the scene.

After the woman and her boyfriend were contacted authorities said they learned the couple had previously been staying at an Ocean Shores motel in the 600 block of Ocean Shores Boulevard..............

They do not live in Ocean Shores, he said. And after we talked to them, we brought them into Montesano for more formal interviews. At the same time, that information led investigators to the motel room where the birth actually occurred.

Brittany N. Taylor, 21, and Patrick L. Parnel, 22, both of Humptulips, were charged Monday with first degree assault and first degree manslaughter in the death of their newborn daughter, found in a wooded area near the Ocean Shores airport last Friday. The class A felonies carry a maximum penalty of life in prison.

The two made their first court appearance Monday and bail was set at $250,000 each by Grays Harbor District Court Judge Tom Copland who also assigned a criminal defense attorney for each of them. The case is expected to be moved to Superior Court eventually.

Appearing in orange jail jumpsuits, both shed tears as friends and family watched the proceedings.

More at link....just a horrible, horrible story....question: if you are 21 years old, working and living on your own, and have the father's support, why try to keep having a baby a secret?

This is beyond comprehension! I thought @ giving up my second child for adption, but the minute I saw him, I realized I loved him and wild horses couldn't drag him away.

This is normal, natural feelings of a mother.

To remember those feelings and then read @ parents that can physically harm a baby?!

I can't comprehend this! : (((

WTF is wrong with people???

Click to expand...

Same justice, I had a hard second pregnancy and a mental illness diagnosis, coupled with being extremely unwell (and hospitalised) from 30wks pregnant, add stress to that and I want to give up my baby, when my little man was born at 32 weeks, something in me just snapped and I couldn't imagine being without him..

His charges:
Parnel was charged Wednesday with second-degree murder, and his bail went up to $500,000.

&#8220;It&#8217;s documented there were steps taken to conceal this crime,&#8221; Prosecutor Katie Svoboda said.

And hers:
Taylor was pale but calm as her charge was updated to first-degree abandonment of a dependant person. It&#8217;s a Class B felony, with a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison, a reprieve from the possible life sentence she faced if convicted of the manslaughter charge.

Patrick Parnel was sentenced to 40 years in prison on Friday after being convicted of aggravated second-degree murder last month for killing his newborn daughter in Ocean Shores in April of 2013.

Parnel, 23, took his daughter to a vacant lot and bludgeoned the child to death with a ratchet shortly after his girlfriend gave birth to the baby in an Ocean Shores motel. The child&#8217;s body was found on April 5 by an Ocean Shores woman.

Parnel&#8217;s girlfriend, Brittany Taylor, was sentenced to four years and 10 months in prison for her involvement in the newborn&#8217;s death.